Between One Breath and the Next
by KrisEleven
Summary: Set during 'Broken', a series of one-shots as the curse breaks over Storybrooke, and the characters' lives are altered completely. Between one breath and the next, memories are restored, families are reunited, and old heartbreaks are recalled.
1. Discovering the Trick to Caregiving

A/N So apparently I really liked the Once Upon a Time premiere. This will be a quick collection of one-shots - I'm not sure how many - set during 'Broken', and focusing on the changes the characters have to embrace as the curse is broken. The idea of the title is that in a split second - between breaths - everything changes for those who were under the curse and suddenly know who they are, and what the other people in town mean to them. This first one actually doesn't go with the theme I wanted for this set, I realize now that I'm writing this introduction... oops. Technically, this sort of counts. Kind of. Read it anyway. (Oh, and all of them will be 500 words, exactly. A mega-drabble, if you will).

* * *

James had been a father for less than an hour before the curse. Somehow, it hadn't given him the skills he needed to take care of a ten year old boy, alone. Add in his worry for Snow and Emma, the fact that both Rumplestiltskin and the Queen were living within walking distance of his house, and that he wasn't sure whether he should go by David or James (or why the decision worried him) and it had already been a difficult evening.

"Do you have cereal?" Henry asked, eyebrows raised, as he watched James trying to make dinner, their first evening together.

"That I do have… well," he said, digging through his sparse cupboard and seeing just how little attention he'd paid to things like food since Kathryn had moved out, he corrected himself: "I have wheaties." He held up the box.

Henry made a face as he sighed. "It will do, I suppose," he said, seriously, "but if you're going to keep me around, you've got to buy something with sugar in it."

"Noted," James said, pouring Henry a bowl. They sat across from each other at the table. Henry stared at him as he spooned cereal into his mouth, his attention never wavering. James felt unnerved. How much did the kid know about what had been happening in Storybrooke recently? James hadn't exactly been role model material. Was there some kind of trick to this whole caregiving thing that he, so new to the parenting world when his child was snatched away from him, wasn't aware of? What if this wasn't the right thing to do? But who else was there, with Emma and Snow White… gone? Who would keep Henry safe if James couldn't?

The boy chewed his wheaties slowly and swallowed with a grimace. "I think this milk is bad," he said. James jumped up to check the expiry date on the carton. He blanched at the date.

"Yea, hey, Henry? Don't eat anymore of that. Seriously, just… give it to me." He took the bowl of compromised cereal away from the kid and put it in the sink. He rested his head against the cupboard door, berating himself.

"You're not very good at this, are you?" Henry asked from behind him.

James laughed without taking his face away from the door. "No. No, I don't think I am."

"That's okay. Emma wasn't very good at it at first, either, but she got better. Can we talk about the other world?"

James turned around to face Emma's son. Henry smiled up at him, undaunted by everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours.

"Yea, of course we can," James said. "What do you want to know?" He searched the cupboards again, digging up a can of tomato soup and putting it on the stove as Henry asked his questions. And as he told the story of his meeting with Snow and watched as his grandson laughed, he thought that _maybe_… he could do this.


	2. A Thousand Times

Thank you to everyone who is following along. I have a few characters I want to get to, but we'll see how many I can get done before Sunday. :) Whyohwhy did I commit to 500 words per? These two wanted to say _so many things_ to each other! Review if you have time as even criticism is appreciated.

* * *

Neither as the Blue Fairy nor as Mother Superior had she been afraid of speaking the truth, making the hard decisions, or standing her ground. But she wondered, as she walked towards Rumplestiltskin's shop, if her bravery wasn't tinged with stupidity.

The bells rang as she pushed open the door and walked inside. She looked around, noting the magic in objects displayed as if they belonged to this world. As Mr. Gold, he had been amassing power for twenty-eight years, and it answered one of many questions she'd had; he'd known all along who he was, though everyone else had forgotten.

It explained how the man could hate _nuns_, anyway.

"You're _still_ not welcome here," he said from the doorway behind the counter.

She was surprised, despite herself, to see he still looked like Mr. Gold. Still just a man, well dressed and hiding a quiet rage that she'd always recognized and never known the cause of.

She knew now.

"I won't come in any further," she said.

He laughed. "You won't, because you are _leaving_ _my shop_. Unless you have magic, to insist?" He smiled at her silence. "I thought not."

"A land without magic," she said as he turned to leave. He stopped, and she could see even from across the room that his grip tightened on his cane. "You were behind this curse. Not the Queen."

"Oh, she was behind it, dearie."

"But you gave it to her."

He turned and raised one finger. "Sold," he corrected. "Not _gave_. I am not in the business of charity," he said with a flourish of his raised hand.

"Why would you do it?" she whispered, staring at him. His smile faded. "I _told_ you what the price would be. It wasn't just your sacrifice; _all _of us lost _everything_ for you to be brought here. What right did you have –"

"What _right_?" he asked. His voice wasn't loud, but it cut her off as abruptly as if he had shouted. "What _right _did I have? The same right _you_ had to meddle in my affairs." He slammed his cane on the desk, the action so sudden and unexpected that she jumped, her heartbeat racing. "You lost me my boy!"

"He made a wish –"

"No! _You_ wanted rid of me and you used him to that end."

She couldn't deny it, but still raised her chin defiantly. "You could have gone with him. Why did you choose to remain behind, Rumplestiltskin?" He glared at her and didn't answer. "So now you're willing to sacrifice us all for the chance to find your son?"

"A _thousand times_," he hissed. There was silence between them. He was breathing heavily, but when he leaned back and looked away from her, his expression was once again a mask.

"If you're not going to buy something," he said, "you can show yourself out."

The bells rang again as she obeyed. Her hands shook. Yes, she supposed: more than just a _tinge _of stupidity.


	3. Without Saying Goodbye

**A/N **Just watched episode two, and it ended up adding some to this chapter. It was _very_ good, and I have some other story ideas now (god help me), but I still have a couple characters that haven't had their stories explained, so expect at least two more chapters this week. Thanks again to everyone who has been reading along.

* * *

Marco looked, again, at the clock he and August had repaired. It was nearly three hours after August was supposed to arrive, and Marco was worried. He'd appeared every day, faithfully, since they had first agreed to this apprenticeship; it wasn't like him to disappear.

He shook his head, smiling ruefully. Marco wasn't even paying him, why would August feel the need to tell him if he decided to ride out of town as unexpectedly as he'd rode in? If Marco believed that August would not leave without saying goodbye, if was only because he _wanted _to believe it. It was nice to have the young man to spend days with. It was almost like...

Marco sighed at himself. Yet again, he proved himself a sad old man missing something he'd never even had.

A shudder passed through him, like that bone-deep shiver of deep cold or an unexpected fright. Everything he knew to be real turned over and over and shattered as another lifetime of memories forced their way into his mind and heart. Marco had spent his entire life living in the shadow of what he did not have. He had always felt that the pain he carried over a child that had never existed should not have been so very bad.

But his son _had _existed. And even though Geppetto hadn't remembered Pinnochio, his heart had never once stopped missing him.

His eyes alighted on the clock, again, and he faltered for a moment as he tried to recognize something through his panic, but the thought fled him. Stumbling from his shop, he looked up and down the street. He didn't think of the curse and his fake memories and the lost time. The only thing he wanted was to find his son.

Emma could only be Snow White and the Prince's daughter, but why wasn't Pinnochio with her? Geppetto had no memories of his son after he had hidden him in the wardrobe, giving him away for the chance that he would be saved. He spent the day frantically asking anyone who would listen, but at the end of it, Geppetto sat in Granny's nursing a coffee that failed to warm him, accepting that his search came up fruitless because his son had never made it to Storybrooke.

And then Henry whispered in his ear and everything he should have known made sense again.

The years had changed him, but Geppetto should have known. That _something_ behind the panic of waking and realizing that his son had been missing with no one looking for him for nearly thirty years should have told him; he had known as soon as he had seen the clock that August had helped to fix. Geppetto would recognize Pinnochio's work anywhere.

Holding his son's hat in an empty room, Geppetto knew that his heart hadn't ached for twenty-eight years without reason. And he knew that one day his son would return:

Geppetto believed that Pinnochio would not leave without saying goodbye.


End file.
